I use a focus planner and notion as tools.

In the focus planner I put the yearly goals and the weekly goals at the beginning of the book and then each day before going to bed, I write the 3-5 most important things I have to do the following day.

Then I use Notion for all the details and live projects...It's a wonderful tool to stay organized

Getting rid of the distractions is pretty important too, the ecosystem is way more powerful than willpower, so I try to keep my place as uncluttered and tidy as possible, including my devices

This, in a nutshell, it's actually a huge topic of conversation!

Hello Mark

I use Google Docs.

Similar to what Artkantos does, I also have yearly, weekly & daily goals.

I find having my organizer online is really easy and convenient to access from my work or home computer or on my cell phone. Its free to use and super easy to learn. All you need is a Gmail account and it is one of the many things that comes with it.

Google Docs allows you to to have multiple "documents" which are basically blank sheets that you can set up as you want to. For example you could have one for "home", "long term goals", "vacation ideas", "to do lists" etc.

Google Docs helps me stay organized and stay on track. I need to have things typed out, I cant read my own writing.

I hope this helps you
Bill

Work-wise, I have a basic spreadsheet that tracks all the things I've done for the day. It's like a mental note or something.

Outside of work, i.e. during holidays/weekends, it's usually cycling/training in the morning, and rest/errands as needed the rest of the day.

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Do these few things and you'll be more effective than you can imagine.


1. Have your BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) out in front of you every day. Especially in the morning as you wake up, shave etc. Maybe written on a card stuck to the bathroom mirror. I know all too well the "Well, what am I going to do now? What do I feel like doing today?" mystery confronting the founder when you wake up...and that leads to a bunch of well-meant but disconnected efforts and nothing built over time. We need that reminder of "This Is What We Are Doing". I even hire coaches to meet with me once every couple of weeks or every month to ensure I'm staying on my annual plan track. Left to myself, I know I easily get distracted with the next shiny thing--I'm an ENTP and this is what happens with my behavioral type. Curious what yours is.

2. Know your Golden Hours. I am awesome at copywriting at night. I make great sales calls in the afternoon. I do effective grindy writing (hey look, that's what I'm doing right now!) and admin tasks that move the company forward during the morning.

Knowing these preferences, I schedule my tasks accordingly. I do not try and do copywriting in the middle of the day. It won't work. I don't try doing sales calls at 9AM. While I'll be awake and alert, I won't be as mellow as I need to be. So knowing my Golden Hours, I can take upcoming events and put them in my calendar when I know I have the best opportunity and energy to complete them well.

3. Batch your tasks. Every time you get distracted from an activity and try to go back to it, it takes 10, 15 minutes and maybe more to get back into The Zone. So if you don't batch out your calendar--for writing, calling, meetings, creative, etc.--putting like tasks together in blocks, you're going through this adaptation every single time you change tasks. You have to shift gears from writing to calling. It's a drain. Pick certain days and certain times to do specific kinds of tasks, and batch them together. You'll become a lot more effective.

To help you see what you've been doing, keep track of your tasks for every 15 or 30 minutes for two weeks. Then go back and see how you spent your time. You'll be surprised! Look at the totals you're spending on different types of work. See if that's best for your behavioral type or if you should be delegating. Rejigger your life--this is the chance to do it. And batch the remaining tasks.

4. Understand your business rhythms. Yes, you've got rhythm! Observe your activities carefully. As you grow a business, you'll find there's an ebb and flow, a back and forth. One week you'll find yourself doing outreach, talking to new people, getting clients. The next, you'll be implementing, building, looking in the business. You can call these polishing (outside) and greasing (inside).

I have seen people go years flipping back and forth, not understanding there is a natural rhythm here, and getting frustrated with, "Why is my work in this business never the same?!" They feel there's always an emergency coming up. But if they understood and rode the rhythm, they wouldn't feel that way about it. The switch back and forth would be normal. For you, it might end up being every two weeks, I don't know. It doesn't have to be a week greasing and then a week polishing. But know this rhythm is a thing.

5. Read and implement David Allen's Getting Things Done. Hire someone to be your "cruel taskmaster" when it comes to GTD if you can't be that person.

6. Remember to build in blocks of unassigned time. This is for learning, reading, relaxing, gelling. Wall-to-wall appointments and tasks is no good: I know from personal experience. That was my world in 2012-14 and it sucked.

Do these few things and you'll have massive control over your schedule. More than just about anybody. I coach founders and nearly all of them are at the mercy of their calendar and incoming events. My way... you know your strengths, you don't schedule anything when your energy is low, you stay away from the land mines of booking tasks when you know you wouldn't be at your best for them, and you have well-understood processes for handing decisions so it's not making things up every time as if it was a new problem. (It's not). And make sure you block out that downtime (#6). It's critical.

Less'n you bleev you gowin' to Thuh Aftalife (& plenny hopptschrwaahns're available, both online & c/o clammy hands & essential BLACKMAIL), natchrlly you only gaht limited time to do stuff.

I believe Steve Jobs said similah a while back, but he dead now, so we eithah gotta paraphrase, reinvent the wheel, diss as crayzee, or make peace with the world as it is today c/o the fusion 'tween alla the best smarts we gaht & the propulsive magnitood of the heartsy animyools stompin' around rn.

This demands we considah our place in history without gettin' too far up our own ass or trashin' stuff for our kids.

An' their pets.

As a Yogah gal, gotta tellya the biggest prahblem we gaht with time stuffs is wantin' to control the fkr.

Whatevah the pulse of your bein' demands time as essential rockit fyool.

Which kinda puts it in control whatevah you dowin'.

So if'n all things are equal this way, what happens next whenya haul yusself up offa the floor an' into balance of next potential oblivion/chance/Wal-Mart?

My advice?

Do summa yr favo stuffs.

If'n you cain't ... or if'n you cain't decide ... get speshly slectional.

Wield ye the hatchet of finest chahp!

& nevah your Chillout Sweetie mustya drahp.

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I have been experimenting with Toggl which is a time tracker. I put my to do tasks in Microsoft To Do. Then when I'm ready to work I can choose one of them to track with Toggl. Toggl has a timer and can give you a graphical look at where you are spending your time.

I made a project called Wandering and another called Warrior Forum in Toggl. So, every time I was doing one of those two things, I'd hit the tracker. I was embarrassed to see how much I was spending on those two areas in the beginning. I've started having to use a reward system: do these 10 things and then scroll FB (or whatever) for 15 minutes. Then back to it.

I've found that sometimes my focus is in the 10-15 minute range only for some reason so I set the timer accordingly.

My golden hours are 4 AM-about 10 AM then it goes downhill from there. So, I go to bed early and get up early.

I'm still honing and experimenting though. One of my problems is I have important tasks/notes in Teams, Word, Outlook, OneNote, Planner, To Do, etc. so it gets had to track down everything when I need it.

Some people may not have these issues. It all comes down to self-discipline and your desire. But knowing that people like Bill Gates and Elon Musk plan their day to the *minute* (day divided into five-minute blocks) means I'm in good company. I work hard, I'm disciplined, I have the burning desire but sometimes you just have to channel all that.

Thanks for the suggestions so far. Keep them coming.

Mark

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how to get things done:
5 seconds rule Mel robbins is good.

How to structure the day:
google keep, daily update, 'loading' daily from the google keep

after finishing all the project a-z, sign off, lay back think a bit, plan and do again.

I have an excel sheet with a tab for
what needs to be done in the next 24 to 48 hours,

what needs to be done in the next 7 days,
what needs to be done in the next 30 days,
what needs to be done in the next 6 months,
in the next 12 months,
in the next 3 years.


"Needs to be done" includes goals I have.


I'm easily distracted: this keeps me focused... Planners and calendars and other such things did not work.


I think, for me, the fact that I can see all the tabs at one glance does the trick.

I set an alarm to wake up early. Otherwise i wake up late in the day. I tell myself that I only want to work on my site for 3 hours per day, so that i can relax and chill for the rest of the day. So i created a marketing sheet that has all the marketing strategies and links for me to go to do my marketing. This streamlines the process for me, and makes things very simple for me to get accomplished.

Every night before I'm ready to switch off and relax, I write down in my day planner what I want to get done the next day and I schedule it into my phone like an appointment with an alarm. When it goes off I know exactly what I need to be working on and for how long so I can fit all of my goals in that day. I find doing it like this one day at a time gets me there faster than if I just focus on the big goal at the end.

I use this app called TASKMUNCHER - find it on the appstore. Simple and effective app.